


When I Watch The World Burn (All I Think About Is You)

by CosmicOcelot



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Angst, Casual Sex, Crowley rescuing children under the guise of screwing over the divine plan, Crowley's existential angst, Fluff, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M, Misunderstandings, Murder, Mutual Pining, References to Sex, Violence, being morons, but Crowley chooses to be female presenting as well, male presenting for the most part, mentions of the '14 century', oysters in rome, possible references to literary icons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2020-05-19 18:27:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19362187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CosmicOcelot/pseuds/CosmicOcelot
Summary: Behold: Crowley, taking 6000 years to figure out the difference between Love and Lust.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I am hurting some characters lately, but let me jump on the Good Omens train before it departs with this. Take care to mind the tags.

 

  
“Did you see them?” 

Aziraphale looks at him, half of his attention clearly still focused on the battle between man and beast playing out before them, body leaning slightly forward as though ready to intervene if necessary.

“What?” 

“You know, when they were—” Crawly makes a vague gesture. “In the process.”

It takes a moment for Aziraphale to get it and then the flustered outrage on his face is priceless.

“Did I—good gracious— _no_.” Aziraphale straightens his shoulders, returning his gaze back to the battle, but his attention is clearly now on their conversation. “Did you?”

“Yes.”

It was new, watching the way that they regarded each other after the bite of the apple, how their eyes lingered on certain parts of the anatomy, fingers reaching out to trace the other’s skin, gradually coming closer, entangling themselves with the other—the rush of a new feeling he can practically taste in the air sending shivers down his spine.

He has memories, of before, when his wings were made of the same pure light as Aziraphale’s, and in them is something faded—only the faintest trace of a phantom ache—twisting ‘round the universe with other beings, meeting and separating in a rush of energy and life and— _something_ —as they made stars and heavenly bodies out of nothing. But even though he can’t quite remember it, he thinks that _something_ might have been similar to the way that Adam and Eve feel after the new thing, entwined together with hands gently stroking as they breathed each other in.

And in a disquieting turn, he finds himself with an irascible itch to experience it again. Just to make sure, of course. He is a thing of sharp angles, rotted from the inside out, with the stain visible for all to see on his wings and in his eyes—he has no need for this soft feeling.

“Of course, you would,” Aziraphale huffs, distaste dripping like venom from his voice, odd, considering who the snake is between the two of them. “It’s a _vice_ after all.”

“ _Vice_?” Crawly drawls the word, feeling it out with his tongue. “What’s that then?”

“Well, it’s, an impulse—an action of evil.” Aziraphale manages, and Crawly wonders if perhaps he isn’t entirely sure of what they are either. “There are seven of them, and seven actions of good, called virtues.”

Crawly nods in understanding. “Ah. And that— _that’s_ one of them is it? Unfortunate, seeing as that’s the only way they can make more.”

“Well,” Aziraphale titters, wringing his hands a little, “They weren’t _supposed_ to make more, that’s the whole problem.”

But he frowns at the end of his explanation, and Crawly remembers the fierce way he had defended giving away his sword to protect that _problem._

It makes sense though, this sudden hunger for that feeling, if it’s a _problem—_ because that’s what he’s supposed to do isn’t it? Creating problems and revelling in them is his modus operandi now.

The sky cracks in a flash of light overhead, a fierce rumbling that threatens to shake the ground beneath their feet following, and before them Adam and Eve walk away from the real first murder.

Something wet and cold starts to fall from the sky, and Crawly shivers, angling away from it when the flutter of white feathers draws his attention, and he realizes the angel has raised a wing to shield him from the downpour.

He hesitates only a moment more before shuffling closer, under its cover and out of the damp. “Doesn’t this go against one of those virtues of yours?”

“No, this _is_ one, actually.” Aziraphale sends him a small smile. “It's called Kindness.” 

It sets Crawly’s teeth on edge, though not as much as the warmth it creates inside him does. “That so.”

He nods towards where Adam and Eve are nothing more than two dots against the horizon. “What was theirs called?”

Aziraphale doesn’t say anything for a while, and Crawly has just resolved to just to look it up back underground when he finally speaks.

“Lust.”

“Lust.” Crawly sounds out the word, stressing the ‘s’ at the end until it devolves into nothing more than a hiss. “Right then.”

* * *

There are places, dark and dingy, that spring up after the humans start to build bigger and better homes for themselves, usually off in a corner of a dark street where only the most desolate roam—and it’s here that he goes looking. 

He watches, for the first few times. Observing how the men and women are draped in fabrics designed to show as much skin as possible while still covering up those areas that Adam and Eve had deemed _unseemly_ all those years before. Takes in the way that they lounge on the few seats available, drag their fingertips along the patron’s arms and chest, enticing them to return the touches in kind.  
  
When he thinks he’s got enough of a sense of what to do he joins them—draped in black fabric that hangs low on his hips and shoulders; a little thrill of power dancing up his spine as he feels the way their eyes follow him. And when someone leans in close and takes him by the hand to the back rooms, well, that takes a while to master, but eventually he learns how to pull sounds, whimpers, begs, _benedictions_ , out of their mouths just as easily as all the others do.

But it’s not the same.

The frisson of feeling, this deep pounding need that darkens their eyes as he entwines with them, it isn’t what he’s looking for—is so far away from that soft phantom ache to be laughable. This is something entirely different, not a merging together of beings but a fire that flares with a desperate frenzy—burning all those who aren’t careful in their ministrations of it.

Maybe this is how it’s supposed to feel for him—maybe this is the closest something like him can get.

He leaves when his perpetual age really starts to pick up attention, but even outside of the dark and dingey rooms where hot breath falls in ragged pants against glistening skin, the mortals are still in its thrall.

He sees it for the first time when he’s trying to convince a guard to give in to Sloth—to avoid extra paperwork and time spent on a dirty, stick-thin child, clutching her stolen piece of bread to her chest like it’s the holiest thing she’s ever seen.

The guard looks at him, and there’s that dark glimmer in his eyes as they flicker over his body, and it makes sense to Crawly; tempting someone into two cardinal sins for the price of letting a starving child eat.

He watches the girl slip away from the two of them as he brings their lips together, sliding his arms around the guard’s neck; waiting a moment more for good measure, allowing the guard to reciprocate with fumbling hands beneath his shirt, before snapping his fingers and letting the guard crumple none too gently to the dirt below.

A few blocks out of hearing range for the garbled snoring, he marvels at how flawed they are and wonders _why_ God didn’t make it harder on them to do the bad thing—not the other way around.

* * *

“That’s what you get—playing favourites.” 

Aziraphale doesn’t hesitate in sending him a viscously reproachful look. “Could you manage just one sentence without blasphemy?

“Probably, but that would require me caring to try.” He gestures towards where Eve is clutching the body of her youngest son to her chest, head tipped back in an almost unearthly wail. “You to admit, if _She’d_ just given them both a pat on the head and a ‘job well done’ he wouldn’t have felt the need to cave someone’s head in. Not saying that isn't a bit of an extreme reaction, mind you—”

“This is one of your kind, isn’t it?” Aziraphale cuts in sharply, and for first time Crawly notices the tears brimming in his eyes. “Whispering some nonsense into his ear that made him think that this—that made him want—that made him _do this_.”

Crawly looks away and shrugs. “Someone ambitious might take credit for it—but word from below is that they’re just as surprised as your lot are.”

Silence falls over them as they watch Adam try to pull Eve away from Abel, only for her to fight him off and clutch even tighter. 

“He was so… _Good_.” Aziraphale says, and Crawly listens. “I made sure—looked after them and kept away anything _Bad_ I’m sure of it—I…”

He trails off shaking his head with a touch of desperation. “Maybe—maybe I made a mistake somewhere—”

“That would be a lot better, wouldn’t it?” Crawly murmurs. “If it was your mistake and not just… _them_.”

“It wouldn’t be _better_ —nothing could make _this_ better.” Aziraphale snaps, “But if I could avoid making the same mistake in the future—if I could prevent this happening again—”

“Right.” Crawly turns away from where Adam is carrying the body of a boy who used to clap his hands and giggle when Crawly would slither around and tickle his feet, his mother clawing at the place where his blood soaked into the ground as though she could call back his life through sheer will alone. “Let me know when you figure out which one it is.”

“Crawly.”

He turns back as though pulled by a string, Aziraphale still looking at the scene continuing to play out.

“Do you have…something to do right now?”

He comes back and slides down into the dirt next to Aziraphale, face turned around from the scene to the violently red clouds and the last golden rays caressing the land. “No, you?”

“No.”

Aziraphale sits down next to him, and the two of them stay there until Abel is safely in the ground the next morning, white wings wrapping around them both when the cold night air starts to set in.

* * *

“What on earth—” 

“Not much of that left anymore.”

Aziraphale just stands there, gaping at him, the great snake of Eden, the hand that rocked the cradle and caused the original sin, tucked up in a corner on the last safe haven of a world of water, with a dozen children curled up asleep around him.

Crowley shifts his wings slightly, as though obscuring the children behind the black sheen of his feathers will somehow cause Aziraphale to forget they ever existed. “No need to bother with us, I got, uh, bread, so—” He waves a wicker basket at Aziraphale, “—we won’t carve up the lions for steak, promise.”

Aziraphale doesn’t say anything, just keeps staring at him like he can’t quite believe his eyes.

“Look, I’m just—” Crowley shrugs, not the _least_ bit defensively, “I’m _thwarting_ all right? God wants to fill everyone’s lungs with water—I make sure that doesn’t happen so, you know, divine plan thwarted, evil prevails, Hail Satan.”

Aziraphale is starting to smile now and Crowley positively despise the way it makes something in his stomach flutter abominably.

“Shut it—you’ll wake them up.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“They can feel you— _thinking_.”

“Ah, apologies.”

* * *

“What do you think?” 

He purses his lips, evaluating the sensation dancing over his tongue and throat, and trying to ignore the expectant look of his conversation partner. “Slippery.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale looks rather crestfallen, “you don’t like it.”

“I didn’t say that.” Crowley counters, determinedly picking up another oyster and slurping it down with avarice. “It’s just…new.”

Aziraphale wrings his hands nervously. “You don’t have to force yourself, Crowley—”

“I’m a Demon, Angel.” Crowley raises an eyebrow at him. “You really think I’d _force_ myself to do anything I didn’t want to?”

Aziraphale huffs out a laugh. “Point taken.”

A serving girl comes over and places down a place of fish covered in some sort of sauce in front of them, darting away before Crowley can voice his questions.

He points at the fish and looks at Aziraphale. “Did you order this?”

“Oh, well, I—” Aziraphale looks a little flustered. “I was rather worried that the oysters might not be your cup of tea, so I took the liberty of ordering another dish that I thought might appeal more to your tastes.”

And it’s then that he feels it, for the first time, that phantom ache, tug ever so gently in his chest.

“You didn’t have to do that.” Crowley mutters into his empty goblet, setting it down and looking everywhere but Aziraphale, not that he can see that behind the dark glasses. “It’s not like I’m going to starve.” 

“I invited you out for food, Crowley.” Aziraphale admonishes, taking the empty goblet and filling it up with some more of that sweet-smelling wine. “It’s important to me that you—well at least enjoy _some_ of it.”

Crowley doesn’t say anything, sitting there while Aziraphale looks between him and the dish with that same expectant look, caught up in the sudden dizzying rush of that feeling.

Eventually he reaches forward and snares a piece of fish with his fingers, popping it into his mouth and licking his fingers to get the last traces of sauce.

Aziraphale’s eyes track the movement carefully, lingering on his lips for a moment before returning to where his eyes are hidden behind the glasses. “Well?”

“ ‘S nice.” Crowley mutters, taking a long pull from his re-filled goblet.

“Oh good,” Aziraphale breathes, reaching a hand forward to touch Crowley’s hand, gripping it tightly and squeezing, “I’m so glad.”  
  
And it’s no longer a phantom, but a true ache, searing his chest with blinding intensity, the place where his heart should be, dark and rotten as it is, squeezing painfully. And it’s terrifying, the things that he would do for this rush of warmth enveloping him—what he would do to be wrapped up in this feeling forever. Because there’s no mistaking it now, no blaming it on an errant sensation caused by imbibing too much wine. This feeling, it’s exactly the same as the one from before the Fall—from the stars and dancing orbs swirling in a beautiful kaleidoscope of colours and energy.

“Ah.” Aziraphale remembers himself a moment later, shock, bewilderment and not an insignificant amount of distress practically pouring from him as he pulls his hand back and places it his lap.

Understandable, given the Cardinal sin he’d gotten so near to.

“Don’t worry about it.” Crowley says, his hand suddenly unbearably cold, and he drains the rest of his wine in order to warm himself up. “I don’t think it’s catching.”

No matter how much he wants it to be.

* * *

It occurs to him, sometime around the 14th century, that perhaps he ought to try this whole ‘marriage’ shtick. After all, that’s what Adam and Eve had done, when they left the garden, and maybe that’s what one was supposed to do in order to get that feeling. Perhaps the key was not quantity, but rather quality and consistency—just not the particular quality and consistency that his wretched heart is set on. 

He scouts out what he stubbornly tells that ache within him are the best options, someone who won’t get too upset when twenty years go by and they have no biological heirs to their name, and he settles on someone named Matthew, Lord of such and such, and the seventh son of a rather illustrious and expansive family.

It’s frighteningly easy to ensnare him, a comment here, a sly brush of fingers there, and suddenly they’re spending their days taking walks around the countryside and Matthew is stumbling is way through sonnets and soliloquies about Crowley’s virtues. It makes her want to throw his head back and laugh, loud and acridly, half-convinced already that she had it wrong—never mind the different form she's taken now—this isn’t going to work—

But then one lazy summer evening, Matthew reaches out his hand and takes Crowley’s gingerly in his own, pressing lips to her knuckles with a soft murmur soaked in open and unashamed Lust. And once again she feels that warmth spread through her, though, her traitorous mind whispers, not as intense as the night she had her first and last taste of oyster. 

Matthew smiles at her, bringing his other hand up to gently stroke Crowley’s cheek, and the sunlight catching in his blonde hair makes it look almost white. And it’s not what the ache in her wants, though it is close, just not _quite_. But if she was intrigued by the feeling before, well now—  
  
Now she craves it.

She hoards every scrap of it Matthew offers her, flowers from the market, quiet embraces as they watch the stars, fingers tangled ever so gently around her own, always desperately— _pathetically_ —hungry for more, and when Matthew asks her to marry him, Crowley’s answer is past her lips before he can finish the offer.

But then it all goes wrong.

Matthew… _changes_ after they’re married—small things at first, he no longer brings home fresh flowers from the market when they’re in season, has less time to talk about the stars and how many there are. But each night he wraps himself around Crowley and wrings clumsy pleasure from her body, tracing his fingertips across her skin every morning and pressing a kiss to her knuckles before he leaves for the day.

And then gradually, there are more changes, Crowley isn’t allowed to leave the manor without Matthew—he whispers to her about a plague sweeping through the land and how he’s so _so_ worried about his love and to please, _please_ stay where it’s safe—and then the people working their land start to get sick, which puts a strain on the finances and food available to them.

She can feel the inky hand of Pestilence at work, a sickness that blankets everything, and though she tries to miracle the fever away from the gardener’s child she only manages to keep it at bay for a few days before Matthew realizes where she’s sneaking out to and drags her back to the manor; pleading with her to stay put. And how can Crowley deny him this one request when she’s taken so much from him already?

The gardener’s child dies a few days after.

The gardener comes up to the manor and screams himself hoarse, calling Crowley _a witch, a devil, a demon_ that cursed his precious daughter—why else would she die so soon after her visit?

Matthew cuts off his wails of grief with a sword through the heart.

Crowley screams in his place, hands scrabbling as she begs the life to go back into the body on their carpet, like Eve had done all those years ago

Matthew locks him in their bedroom, saying he’ll let Crowley out when she stops being hysterical.

And the affection only comes after fists now, apologies breathed into bruises that take the shape of finger and hand prints, a gentle strokes of her hair as someone sobs for forgiveness—the grey light from the ash covered air outside filtering through the window as Crowley lies there, feeling extraordinarily empty in a way that she hasn’t since the Fall.

She wonders if it was always doomed to end up this way—her nature twisting even the most benign Lust, the most wonderful people, with Wrath and Greed and Gluttony until the end result is unrecognizable.

* * *

Sleep is a welcome reprieve and she spends most of his time lost in its soft tumbling embrace, dreams sliding by her like a stream of water through his fingertips.

“Oh, Crowley.

There’s a flutter of air that has her cracking open her eyes briefly, and she sees familiar soft eyes and white hair before they slide closed again. “Hi, Angel.”

A hand gently tucks a stray hair behind her ear and then arms are under her, scooping her up and into the air, her face resting against someone’s chest.

She frowns, struggling as much as she can in the grip. “Hang on—I’ve got—Matthew?”

They stop moving, hands readjusting Crowley until she’s being held in a position more comfortable for both of them.

“Took a fall I’m afraid. A rather bad one at that.”

“A fall?” A giggle bursts forth from Crowley’s lips and pretty soon she’s devolved into hysterical laughter.

It’s all horrifically poetic.

“Poor Matthew.”

There’s no answer, apart from the slight tightening of the grip on her.

Crowley cracks open her eyes, watching the colours and lines around them blur together inseparably, addressing her next remark to them. “He was my husband, you know.”

“I know.”

“Not a very good one, I think.” Crowley lets his eyes slip closed again before the colours can make her too dizzy. “But that’s cause of—you know—me.”

“It most certainly is _not_.”

Crowley curls further into the sudden wave of heat pouring off the figure. “ ’m a Demon, all I do is…twist things—”

“That doesn’t mean that you caused him to—and it certainly doesn’t give him the right to—you’re not _responsible_ for this, Crowley.” The voice is firm, no room for argument, and Crowley is too tired to do anything another than let the words settle in her like balm for an old wound. “Not for any of it.”

In the morning, when Crowley wakes in a cottage filled with scrolls and the smell of old leather and string, he’ll write a note on the back of a spare piece of letter paper he finds on a well-kept desk. The note will have one word, because there aren’t enough to convey what he really wants to say, and Crowley will leave to fall apart and then try and put himself back together on his own; far away from the eyes he’s been dreaming about for the past few thousand years.

But for now, the morning is far away and unknown, and Crowley lets the steady heartbeat against her ear lull her to sleep. 

* * *

“D’you know what they’re calling this one?” 

Aziraphale must not be getting notes from Heaven about extraneous miracles anymore, because his sugar pot is full as Crowley reaches past it to pour himself a black coffee. The fact that his coffee supply is almost untouched isn’t that much of a surprise in comparison, it’s only him who drinks it after all.

“Yes.” Aziraphale is watching the people pass his bookshop with leaden steps, backs bent by the invisible weight laying on their shoulders. “The Great War.”

Crowley huffs out a bitter laugh. “ _The War To End All Wars_. As though humans can make it to teatime without coming up with reasons and ideas on how to slaughter one another. Still,” he indicates towards the empty store, just them and the books occupying the space, “at least your precious books are safe for now.”

Aziraphale shoots him a reproachful look without much heat that Crowley returns with a grin, taking a burning gulp of caffeine and sliding down onto the couch. “Can you image, though, if this was actually it? The last war for humans—ever?”

“Yes.” Aziraphale turns to level Crowley with one of those looks that signal another ‘ineffable’ speech is incoming imminently. “There is peace and kindness and lov—well, _good_ things, for a reason.”

Crowley frowns, heart squeezing at that aborted word, cocking his head to the side. “Thought your lot didn’t really go in for that sort of thing.”

“What? Peace and kindness?” Aziraphale blinks at him.

Crowley huffs out a sigh, rolling his eyes behind the glasses. “No, Lust.”

“ _Lust_?” Aziraphale looks at Crowley like he’s grown another head again. “Crowley, what on earth are you talking about?”

“Y’know,” Crowley waves his hand errantly, “Lust, Love, same difference.”

Aziraphale lets out a sound that sounds rather chocked. “I assure you there can be a fairly big difference.”

“What?” And now it’s Crowley’s face screwed up in confusion. “Hang on, what are you talking about?”

“Oh, stop teasing me, Crowley.” Aziraphale snaps. “It’s terribly unkind of you and I refuse to entertain you by going into the various— _details_ —of it—which I’m sure I don’t need to tell _you_ about.”

Something sticks in the back of his throat, a realization of _wrong_ that sends alarm bells through his head, like finding out you’d somehow left the house with only your pants—only realizing when you were utterly open and terribly exposed—like skin peeled back to reveal the raw nerves underneath--when it was too late.

Aziraphale’s face changes then, from open frustration to something more… _curious_ and almost hesitant, and Crowley struggles to school his features into a careful mask of neutrality.

“Do I?”

Crowley tosses the rest of his coffee back and miracles the cup back to the kitchen. “Of course not, Angel, just ruffling your feathers.” He stands up and makes his way to the door. “Can’t stay, got lots of tempting to do—you know how it is—”

“Crowley—”

Aziraphale is looking at with an unbearable amount of tenderness, hand outstretched just a little in front of him, as though fighting with whether or not to pull him back, and in an instant that ache in his chest is back and Go—Sata— _Somebody_ —why did he ever want to know what this feeling was?

So he tilts his head to the side, body shifting and becoming open and inviting, a smirk curling the edges of his lips. “Unless you really would like to fill me in on the, ah,” his eyes flicker up and down Aziraphale’s form, making a show of drinking him in, “ _details_.”

And he sees it then, the flicker of the familiar dark glimmer in Aziraphale’s eyes, his mouth parting slightly, even as the flustered outrage begins to take shape.

“Just another ruffle, Angel.” Crowley says, turning away from that gaze and how it sets this body ablaze, heat burning low in his gut. Because he’ll be damned—a thousand times more than he already is—if he lets this—if he lets _him_ —infect _Aziraphale_.

“See you when I see you.”

* * *

He tries to figure it out on his own, tucked away in a library in Edinburgh, but every reference he finds is utterly vague and frustratingly flowery and _makes no sense_ —as though the writers themselves have no idea what the thing they’re trying to describe is either.

“Can I help you, sir?”

He peers over the edge of the book he’s reading, feet kicked up on the chair opposite of the one he’s sprawled in, regarding the rather stern librarian trying to bore a hole through him with her glare.

He’s about to tell her to piss off, but then a thought stops him.  
  
“That remains to be seen.”

He snaps his fingers and the woman goes still, face relaxing from a sour glare to a neutral one. Always better to get these things straight from the horse’s mouth after all.

“What’s the difference,” He drawls, letting the book fall from his fingers carelessly to the table, not even considering the betrayed look that Aziraphale would level him with if he was here, “between Love and Lust?”

“Lust,” The woman intones, as though reading from an incredibly dry slideshow, “can be defined as a craving. One can have a lust for life, friendship, or knowledge. In the most archaic sense, it refers to desire to engage with another person in sexual activities. Simply put, it is desire.”

“Yes, yes, I know about that,” Crowley says, impatiently, waving his hand as though that will get her to speak faster. “What’s Love then? How is that…different?”

“Love.” The woman repeats. “Love is affection, care, kindness—soft kisses in the rain and someone buying your favourite kind of tea because you mentioned it once in passing—”

“Yes, I’ve read sops like that, but _what_ _is it_.” Crowley interrupts. “Define it, like you defined the other thing.”

The woman is silent for a moment and he wonders in a fit of pique whether he’s broken her or something.

“I can’t.” She says finally. “Love means different things for different people—we all understand the feeling, but we can’t put it into exact words—not without missing bits of it. It’s ineffable—”

“ _Ineffable_?” Crowley snarls, pushing away the images of food ordered just for him, wings wrapped so carefully around him, a hand covering his own with a gentle squeeze, and pushing himself up from the table. “How absolutely _fucking_ ridiculous—what’s the bloody point of coming up with a thing nobody can describe?!”

He storms out of the library and into the rain, remembering when he’s in the Bentley to release the woman with another snap of his fingers, and drives back to London like God herself is on his tail.

But despite his best efforts, by the time he gets back to his apartment he realizes, with growing, bone-chilling dread, just what it is that _love_ means to him and he spends the next few hours smashing anything and everything breakable in his immediate vicinity.  

It makes sense, that Love, this gentle and pure thing, would work like this with him. His nature twisting and corrupting it to cruel, desperate, _sinful_ Lust instead—soft presses of lips to locked doors and purple marks staining skin. And he knows, truly, and deeply, for the first time, that he can never have that warmth and wonderful ache again. Because he doesn’t belong among the stars anymore, he belongs underground, buried down deep with all the other decaying and desiccated things. 

He just wishes he also couldn’t have this utterly _shattering_ need for it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone that has commented and left kudos! I really appreciate it :)  
> Time for Aziraphale POV

_Disgusting_

The word is hissed among the other angels in the garden, contempt for the rebellious creations that would throw all that they have been given away just know the taste of forbidden knowledge—their eyes averted pointedly as Adam and Eve reach for each other, lost in the soft caress of each other’s fingers and sounds of pleasure torn from their lips.

He watches, caught up in a desperate curiosity to understand just what the _hell_ has happened in this haven of sanctity, and instead finds himself wondering, only for a moment, if such a thing, deep and pulling and desperate as it is, so entangled with _Love_ , unlike any he’s ever felt before, can really be so Bad.  

But then the demon appears and openly confesses to looking at it, to watching, without a hint of shame, and his gut drops wrenchingly. And he shoves any curiosity he might have had towards the experience down hard, fiercely telling himself that even if this new thing— _Lust_ , Gabriel called it—isn’t Bad then it is, at the very least, Not Good.

* * *

“Where do you think it went wrong?” 

He can feel Crawly shift into what must be a shrug underneath the soft blanket of feathers that covers them both, the steadily brightening sky signalling that the sun is starting to reclaim her throne from the moon.

“How would I know?”

“You don’t have to _know_.” Aziraphale tells him, eyes never leaving Adam’s shovel as it carefully re-fills the hole that he spent all night digging. “I just wondered if you had a theory.”

Crawly sighs, sounding very put upon for what really is just a simple request. “My _theory_ , Angel, is that sometimes humans do things that we don’t quite like for reasons that we don’t quite understand.”

“Like eat apples they’re not supposed to.” Aziraphale says, in a fit of pique that takes Crawly by surprise, given the way he starts suddenly beneath the white wings.

“Right.”

In his defence, it has been a long night.

Aziraphale watches in silence for a while, Crawly still turned away from the scene towards where the sun has broken through the horizon in her ascent, but as Adam shovels the last bit of dirt into the hole that silence is broken.

“I’ll tell you one thing I know, Angel.” Crawly doesn’t look away from the sunrise when he speaks, and Aziraphale doesn’t look away from the parents burying their child. “This wasn’t anything to do with you. Whatever happened—whatever went…well, _wrong_ , it’s not your fault.”

Aziraphale tries to tell himself the burning in his eyes is from the sunlight, an argument that would be more convincing if he wasn’t facing the wrong way.

“Thank you, that’s—very kind of you to say.”

Crawly moves to stand up in a sudden rush, and Aziraphale quickly retracts his wings from around him in order to let him do so.

“It’s not _kind_ ,” Crawly snaps, “it’s just the truth.”

He starts to saunter away and before Aziraphale can think better of it he’s leaping to his feet as well, turning in the direction of the demon’s escape.

“Crawley?”

He pauses but doesn’t turn around, but the way the morning light plays across his figure, bathing his body in a golden glow and making his hair seem ablaze in light makes something in Aziraphale’s chest quicken.

“Yes, Angel?”

“I—I just want to say,” Aziraphale manages, struggling not to trip over the words, “that I know that it wasn’t—that it wasn’t you either. This, this wasn’t your fault.”

Crawly doesn’t react for a moment, but then he turns slightly, a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes twisting his lips bitterly.

“That’s very kind of you, Angel.”

And as he walks away, something in Aziraphale aches terribly.

* * *

Crawly— _Crowley_ now—and that’ll take a little getting used to, though a part of him balks at the idea of getting used to anything where this demon is concerned—is lying propped up on a woven sack in the bottom of Noah’s Ark, with his wings spread out and a group of children curled up in the feathers. He looks different from usual, casual grace and careful charm absent as he snores softly, his red hair falling over his face and mouth in an errant mess. 

And Aziraphale, for reasons he can’t quite understand, is sitting with him.

Logically, he should have tossed them all overboard the moment he saw them, God had been very clear about who was to get on the Ark and who wasn’t—but, well, it was one thing to send down enough rain to drown a desert and quite another to purposefully fling _children_ to their deaths.

He risks another glance at Craw— _Crowley_ —and wonders if the demon is actually sleeping or if he’s just pretending to for the sake of the children. The more rational explanation, and the one that he’s sure Crowley would insist upon being true, was that he was attempting to appear relaxed and unguarded in an attempt to throw Aziraphale off guard should the messenger of Her Divine Will decide to disrupt this blatant thwarting off it.

But he’d seen the way that Crowley’s eyes had gone wide at the thought of the children being wiped out without a second thought—their laughter turning to terrible gasps for air—and the way that he had looked at Aziraphale when he’d found their little hideaway—like he would fight to extinction to keep them on board. So, there was less chance than usual, which is to say, less than none, of the demon managing to convince Aziraphale that this was all part of his wicked wiles.

And the fact that Aziraphale catches himself smiling just at the thought is probably one of the reasons why he’s sat here right now.

That, and, he thinks to himself exasperatedly, as he reaches over and tucks the stray hair away from his sleeping companion’s face and behind his ears, he doesn’t entirely believe that Crowley won’t cut up the lions for steak if left unattended.

* * *

“Do you remember it?” 

They’re blindingly drunk on a rich, sweet, wine in Rome, holed up among the various scrolls and tablets that Aziraphale has taken to collecting of late, when the question slips clumsily past his lips before he can really think it through.

“Mmm…remember what?” Crowley mumbles into his goblet, and there’s a chance for Aziraphale to save this still—

“Heaven.”  
  
—if only his damn tongue was listening to his brain.

Crowley stills immediately, turning to face him, and he wishes that he hadn’t decided to start wearing these dark glasses over his eyes—it makes him that much harder to read.

“Why d’you ask?”

“Just curious I suppose.” Aziraphale says, deciding to take another sip of wine despite the dizzying rush already surrounding him. “I’ve never heard you talk about it—but then, you’ve never asked me about it either.”

“Oh, well,” Crowley’s voice is practically drenched in caustic sarcasm, “forgive me for not giving a fuck about a place that tossed me out for asking questions.”

“Well, you’re not supposed to ask questions.” Aziraphale protests. “You were supposed to follow orders—that’s the whole idea point of it. Faith, I mean.”

“ _Faith_.” Crowley’s lips curl into a snarl, stressing the sibilants. “Faith isn’t worth a damn—faith gets you nailed to a cross in front of a crowd of people. I don’t know about you, but I prefer this body with its feet on the ground and just enough iron to keep it upright, not hammered into my wrists.”

Aziraphale frowns. “ _That_ was part of the divine plan—”

“Oh, isn’t it always.” Crowley snaps, “And if that’s so, _if_ there _is_ a divine or great or just _a_ plan then _show me a plan_ —give me your reasons—convince me that you know what the heaven you’re doing, and I’ll follow. Don’t strike out my eyes just cause I bothered to _look_.”

His tone, while it had started out acrid and sharp has taken on an element of such deep and profound _longing_ that it strikes at something in the centre of Aziraphale, and he resists the brief impulse to pull Crowley into his arms and pluck out all the sharp things that he continues to hurt himself with.

Instead, Aziraphale sets his goblet down, rising from their shared seat with an air of finality. “This is getting rather off topic.”

“Oh, is it?” Crowley throws back the rest of his wine, pushing to his feet as well. “Sorry, Angel, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“ _Crowley_.”

Aziraphale catches his arm before he can stalk out of the shop and into the night, and Crowley sways dangerously under the grip so he moves his hand to his back to support him.

“Sit back down, you’re in no fit shape to be walking anywhere.”

“I can fix that.” Crowley snaps, but makes no motion to do so, and Aziraphale is doubtful as to whether he can, really.

“Yes, of course,” he says instead, gently leading Crowley back to the couch and easing him back down into its soft embrace, the only one he can offer him. “But I was just about to make myself some of this new tea blend I bought, and it would be nice to have someone to test it with.”

“Poison with, more like.” Crowley mutters, but the waspish energy from before seems to have dissipated somewhat, and he slumps back into the couch fully.

Aziraphale tsks. “Really, Crowley, I would never do that to the tea.”

A shocked kind of silence blankets them both for a moment, Aziraphale’s brain taking a while to fully register what his lips had just formed, and he has an instant to feel horribly embarrassed, an intense flush creeping up his face— 

But then Crowley is throwing his head back and laughing, loud and hard and open, and it throws Aziraphale even more than his slip up, finding himself fascinated by the way that Crowley’s whole body shakes with the force of his laughs before gradually subsiding into breathy chuckles. He finds himself, rather, well, caught by it, the same way his eyes had been caught on Crowley’s lips back at the restaurant.

Crowley tips his head to the side, aiming a smile that is completely open, unguarded, and not an insignificant amount of hypnotizing, right at Aziraphale.

“Good one, Angel, I didn’t know you did jokes.”

“Yes, well,” Aziraphale manages, before quickly busying himself with the tea leaves, “I like to make an effort every now and then—when the mood strikes.”

“Should get into your cups more often.” Crowley’s smile turns to a smirk, and Aziraphale finds, rather disquietingly, that he misses it already.

Aziraphale hums a noise that could be an agreement before setting a tray with the steeping tea pot and two empty cups on the table in front of the couch. And a comfortable sort of silence blankets them both as they wait for the tea to steep.

“Stars.”

Aziraphale turns to look at Crowley. “I’m sorry?”

“Stars.” Crowley repeats, and his voice is quiet, softer than Aziraphale’s ever heard it before. “You asked what I remember, from before—it’s stars, light and,” he makes a vague swirling motion with his hand as though painting on an invisible canvas, “colours, big bright colours, hung up in emptiness.”

He doesn’t look at Aziraphale, but the glasses have slid slightly forward on his nose, allowing Aziraphale to see those familiar yellow eyes from where he’s sitting. They’re completely yellow, no white around the edges like usual, and lost in the fragments of something that only they can see.

And then the moment passes and Crowley curls back into himself, pushing the glasses up to cover his eyes, and pulling his hand back from where it had been outstretched. “S’not exactly a novel.”

“Thank you.” Aziraphale says, and some of the tension in Crowley’s shoulders slips away, “for telling me.”

“Yeah, well…” Crowley shrugs. “That tea of yours better be worth it.”

A laugh escapes him in the form of a soft chuckle, and he pours the tea into the cups before handing one to Crowley, relishing the slight jolt that travels under his skin when their fingers brush.

“Let’s find out.”

* * *

“Where is she.” 

The man is no longer handsome, the carefree look from that summer evening he had stumbled upon the two of them together replaced with haggard lines, those golden locks limp and greasy against his head, but Aziraphale could hardly care less. His focus is narrowed down to a singular point, and he is concerned with one being alone. 

The man’s face screws up in confusion. “Who?”

“Crowley.” Aziraphale says, taking a step closer to the bottom of the stairs. “ _Where is Crowley_.”

It had taken effort to locate the house amid the thick blanket of evil and misery that pestilence has covered the land with—to feel out Crowley’s particular energy amid all the others threatening to drown it out. And if it weren’t for that summer all those evenings ago, when he had spied this man pressing his wretched lips to Crowley’s knuckles, he’s not entirely sure he would have.

He hates himself for it, for the burning in his chest that had kept him from seeking out Crowley again, had kept him buried in ancient words to try and forget the image of Crowley’s red hair set alight in the sunlight, and the way that she had leaned forward as though tethered by an invisible cord to the man in front of her; all those nights torturing himself with what those eyes might have looked like behind those black glasses—when Crowley was going through _this_.

The man’s face twists into an ugly sneer, and Aziraphale’s hands shake with the effort it’s taking to keep from wrapping them around his neck. 

“I don’t know who you think you are,” The man snarls, “but if you think you can just barge in and demand to know where _my wife_ is then you’ve got another thing—”

The man’s foot catches at the top of the stairs and he is falling.

Aziraphale could catch him.

He doesn’t.

* * *

After their interaction in the park, with Crowley passing him the note and the sheer, world-shattering, horror that had risen up so quickly within him at its implications, he stays his bookshop for weeks; cataloguing and re-cataloguing his collection until he’s satisfied with how its arranged. But despite his best efforts to drown himself in the banalities of work, the frantic feeling within him won’t settle.

He makes his way to Crowley’s townhouse a day or so later, a bottle of wine tucked underneath his arm.

There are no lights on in the house when he arrives on the front step, and he hesitates a moment before raising his hand and knocking cautiously.

“Crowley, it’s me.” He calls, hesitantly, but when he gets no reply the frustration of the past few weeks gets the better of him and his knocks become more like bangs. “ _Oh, for heaven’s sake_ —Crowley! Let me in—”

The door pushes forward under the weight of his blows, and Aziraphale thinks for one panicked moment that he’s managed to break the lock, twisting the doorknob and pushing it the rest of the way open only to realize that it’s been unlocked the whole time.

He finds Crowley upstairs, wrapped in blankets with his glasses set on the bedside, his hair strewn about the pillow, completely dead to the world, and so terribly exposed and vulnerable.

He’d even left the damn door unlocked.

“Oh, you foolish thing.” Aziraphale breathes, sitting down on the bed next to him slowly, but Crowley doesn’t so much as shift in his presence. He wonders if this was always his plan should Aziraphale deny him the holy water, to just close his eyes and let any stray smite-happy angel or power-hungry demon do the work for him.  

He snaps his fingers and suddenly the two of them are back in his bookshop, tucked up in the empty bedroom that Aziraphale never uses. It’s a tight fit, the four posters of the demon’s bed scraping the ceiling, but it’s a fit, and Crowley’s only reaction is to twist around in his sleep before settling again with a soft hum.

It’s just common sense, Aziraphale tells himself, tucking the blankets around the sleeping demon and brushing the hair from his face, keep your friends close and your enemies closer and all that.

* * *

“It’s an odd distinction to make.” 

Oscar takes another sip of gin and tonic. “Between what?”

“Love and Lust.” Aziraphale replies, watching as another drunken couple clumsily entwined with one another stumbles out onto the street. “Rather the same thing I think.”

Oscar shakes his head. “Not necessarily.”

“Well explain it to me then.” Aziraphale sighs, “You’re the writer.”

“Sometimes.”

Oscar downs the last of his drink, before leaning forward slightly. “Lust, at its core, is just desire, traditionally for the,” his eyes meet Aziraphale’s with a familiar glint, lips curling into a smirk, “pleasures of the flesh. But it can be for any number of things; companionship, food, drink, affection, understanding. Love, at _its_ core, is when you have some or all of those desires filled by someone, and in turn you fulfill their desires.”

He drums his fingers against the side of his glass. “You and I, we fulfill each other’s lust for companionship…and the more ancient form of it.”

“Sounds more like friendship.” Aziraphale frowns into his glass.

Oscar smiles slightly. “It is, what we have at least—friendship is a part of love, sometimes the only part. But if you’re talking about the more traditionally romantic type, well, that means different things to different people.”

“For example,” He flags down a passing waiter and motions for another drink, “I like you well enough, and I crave the pleasure we give each other—but I don’t crave that pleasure from you alone, don’t wake up every morning desiring your body lying next to mine, and most of all, I don’t desire that you feel any of those things either.”

He mind goes, unbidden, back to where Crowley is lying, still asleep, carefully tucked away from danger in the bedroom above his bookshop—

“Speaking of,” Aziraphale says, wrenching his thoughts back, “I rather think it’s time we got out of here, don’t you?”

Oscar’s lips curve into a smirk that is just familiar enough to work.

* * *

Crowley wakes up the day before the war begins. 

He wonders if he can feel it too, the way bloodlust and desperation hang in the air as War makes them sit on the edges of their seat, waiting for it all to begin—if that’s what it is that finally wakes him up.

Aziraphale is trying to chase away a customer that has been lingering for rather too long, long enough that they might actually be considering, heaven forbid, _buying something_ , when Crowley stumbles down the stairs without a shirt, rubbing a hand over his bleary eyes.

“ ’Ziraphale.”  Crowley mumbles, nearly walking into a bookshelf, “Wha’s—wha’s happening…where—?”

He turns to the wide-eyed customer, snapping in their face, and suddenly they’re rushing out of the door while mumbling something frantic about getting bread before the shops close.

“Crowley,” He sighs, easy exasperation hiding the joy spreading throughout his whole body, “for heaven’s sake, sit down—"

“ ‘m fine.” Crowley insists, but he lets Aziraphale guide him to the couch. “Legs just aren’t—working properly right now…”

“Yes, well, that tends to happen when you don’t use them for a century.”

“A century?” Crowley asks, “Really?”

Aziraphale brings him a cup of coffee. “Yes.”

“‘S quite the lie-in.” Crowley muses, accepting the cup carefully. “D’I miss anythin’?”

Aziraphale thinks of dances in gentleman clubs, discussions in gin palaces, stolen moments of skin against skin and pleasure wrung from his lips as he imagined another body than the one writhing beneath him—

“No, not really.”

* * *

“Let me see them.” 

“It’s _fine_ , Angel—”

“ _Crowley_.”

The demon in question throws his hands up exasperatedly. “Fine! If you’re going to fuss about it—”

“I am.”

Aziraphale kneels down and takes hold of Crowley’s shoe again, and thankfully this time the demon doesn’t try and kick him off, undoing the laces before gingerly sliding his foot free and peeling off the sock.

A hiss of sympathy escapes from between his teeth at the sight that awaits him there, the flesh of Crowley’s feet is a bright pink and looks painful to the touch.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

Crowley shrugs. “Couldn’t have you getting discorporated now, could I? It’d be ages before you managed to make your way back down here with all that paperwork your lot love so much.”

“Still,” Aziraphale frets, moving his hand over the abused skin, Crowley letting out a soft hiss as the flesh heals, “it was awfully kind of you—the books especially—”

Crowley chuckles dryly, and Aziraphale pauses from where he’s tugging off Crowley’s other show.

“What? What is it?”  

“Nothing, just…” Crowley is smiling, like he had all those years ago on that night in Rome, and Aziraphale would give anything to know what his eyes look like right now, “ _You_ , caring more about the books than anything else. Very on brand.”

“Ah, yes, well,” Aziraphale runs his hand over Crowley’s other foot, “consistency and all that.”

“Mm,” Crowley hums, sagging into the couch, the only indication remaining that this whole evening has taken anything out of him, “I admire your commitment to your character.”

His hands are reaching forward before he can stop them, and Crowley’s glasses are in his hand before either of them is completely aware of it.

Both of them freeze, just regarding the other, and Aziraphale is closer to Crowley than he’s ever been, one hand braced against the top of the couch next to Crowley’s shoulder, their noses inches apart; and it strikes Aziraphale just how easy it would be to press his lips together, to finally taste what he’s spent so long denying that he craves.

“Angel?”

Crowley’s voice is soft, questioning, eyes guarded, even without the glasses, and Aziraphale’s heart squeezes painfully with the desperate wish to take a leap of faith across this chasm between them, to finally take Crowley into his arms and wrap him up with as much as love and affection as he can, to press fingers to his skin and tear cries of pleasure from his lips, to be able to see his eyes whenever he wants to—what they look like when he throws his head back and laughs, what they would look like underneath him with his body arched with pleasure, and whether it would be anything similar to the way they look when he graces Aziraphale with that rare and breathtaking smile.

“It’s just us here.” He says instead, slipping the glasses into his suit jacket. “There’s no need for these.”

Crowley says nothing for a moment, his eyes never leaving Aziraphale’s.

“I didn’t realize they bothered you so much.”

“Yes, well,” Aziraphale straightens up and heads to the cabinet, pulling out two wine glasses and a bottle, not really caring to see what kind, “it’s rather disconcerting…carrying a conversation with someone when you can’t see their eyes.”

“You could’ve said something earlier.” Crowley remarks, but it’s without any of his usual bite, and he takes the glass that Aziraphale offers him easily.

Aziraphale shoots him a teasing smile. “Would you have taken them off if I had?”

“Yes.”

It takes him by surprise, heart leaping into his throat, and Crowley turns his head away, mumbling the next words into his glass, a slight flush darkening his cheeks. “I thought—I thought they bothered you—that they reminded you of what I was.”

His lips twist bitterly. “Of what I am.”

“I—” Aziraphale hesitates for only a moment. “I find them quite wonderful, actually.”

Crowley looks like he’s trying to press his whole body into the wine glass, that flush on his cheeks deepening further. “Lying’s a sin, Angel.”

“Then it’s a good job I’m not lying, isn’t it?” Aziraphale returns, feeling more daring than he has in centuries and enjoying the thrill that runs up his spine. “They’re very…expressive, when you allow them to be.”

“ _Expressive_.” Crowley repeats, hissing the ‘s’ between his teeth. “Listen to yourself, Aziraphale—I’m a _demon;_ not some fine art piece.”

 _Aren’t you?_ Aziraphale thinks but stops short of voicing it.

There’s only so much you can take back.

And if his side knew just how much he wanted to give—and how much he wanted to take, to _covet_ , in return—never mind if _Hell_ found out—

He shakes his head. It’ll never happen, and so it doesn’t bear thinking about.

“Tell me,” He stands up and refills both of their glasses before placing the bottle within reach of the couch and sitting back down, “what does the ‘J’ really stand for?”

Crowley sends him a smirk, and just like that, they’re back on familiar ground. Except now, he can see the way that his eyes crinkle mischievously, easy, teasing, humor glinting in them, and while it isn’t anything close to all that he wants—it’s enough.

It has to be.

“That,” Crowley drawls, “is for me to know, Angel, and for you to find out. Maybe.”

Aziraphale rolls his eyes, but that’s fine by him, he’ll work it out eventually.

What matters is having an infinite amount of time to do so.

* * *

Crowley falls asleep on the way back from the Apocalypse-That-Wasn’t, head resting against Aziraphale’s shoulder; his slow, even breaths tickling the side of the Angel’s neck. 

Aziraphale finds himself checking his pulse every few minutes, the steady beat of Crowley’s heart beneath his fingers reminding him that they’re both still there—that they really had survived it all.

They’re almost back to the bookshop when Crowley whimpers in his sleep, face screwing up as his body starts to jerk fitfully. Aziraphale puts his hand on his shoulders in order to keep him from falling off the bus seat, waiting for the dream to pass, but it only deepens, Crowley’s whimpers turning to mangled cries and his body thrashing.

“Crowley—Crowley!”

Aziraphale snaps his fingers and Crowley surges awake with a gasp for air, his whole body shaking, hands desperately scrabbling at the angel's coat, eyes wide and manic.

“It’s alright,” Aziraphale soothes, shifting them so that Crowley’s head is resting against his chest and Aziraphale’s arms are wrapped securely around them, “It’s alright, my dear, you just had a nightmare.”

Crowley shakes like his body is coming apart at the seams, with a terror that makes it feel like ice water is being pushed through his veins, Aziraphale wonders if it is, if this is the fire finally catching up with him like it had the car—hands moving desperately to try and heal anything and everything but after a moment he realizes that there’s nothing _to_ heal. 

Aziraphale makes his hands settle, just focusing on holding Crowley to him, and would have missed Crowley mumbling words into his chest entirely if it weren’t for the vibrations they cause.

“I’m sorry, what did you say?”

Crowley’s hands tighten around Aziraphale to the point of painful, like the angel is the only thing keeping him afloat in a flood to rival the one She had sent.

“Don’t leave me.”

The words are barely a whisper, desperation bleeding from each one like an open wound, and suddenly Aziraphale remembers Crowley’s words in the bar.

_Your bookshop…it burned down._

_I lost my best friend._

“Oh,” he breathes, pressing his face to the top of Crowley’s head, breathing him in, “Oh, Crowley.”

Crowley whimpers in reply, burying his face further into Aziraphale, as though if he just gets close enough then the two of them will be so entwined that no one will be able to tear them apart again. And Aziraphale holds him tightly there, every fiber of his being screaming the promise that falls so quietly from his lips.

“I won’t, my dear. Not ever again.”

* * *

Hell is a mess of twisting dark corridors and shoddy lights, demons nattering among themselves and eyeing him like a lamb brought to the slaughter, and as Aziraphale watches Michael pour the Holy Water into the bathtub, all Aziraphale can think is how ridiculous it is that he let the threat of this—of the both of these sanctimonious _cretins_ —keep him from Crowley. 

Because there is no doubt now, no second guessing himself and worrying that he’s somehow defying the will of the divine plan because—well, frankly— _fuck the divine plan_ , great or otherwise. Any plan that involves wars for the sake of wars and wanton death and destruction just to settle an age-old argument isn’t something he wants any part of.

And really, in his heart, he truly believes that this was all part of the _ineffable plan_ anyway.

* * *

Crowley hasn’t left the bookshop since their lunch at the Ritz, nor has he addressed his extended presence, and Aziraphale hasn’t been able to bring it up either. Perhaps because it’s all so new, the two of them reeling from really, truly being on no side but their own for the first time. Or perhaps because cowardice is a rather hard habit to break. 

He opens the shop on the fifth day, frustration steadily mounting as more and more people dare to enter it, each of them browsing around for a rather worrying period of time. He can feel Crowley watching him from his vantage point, tucked away in a corner of the shop, and sometimes when he turns to face him quick enough, he can catch the last traces of a smile on his lips.

The day takes an even worse turn when he comes down from making himself a cup of tea, lavender and honey, to try and soothe his nerves, and finds that Crowley is now _talking_ to the potential customers.

He leans against bookshelves and engages them in various debates that make their eyes light up and their hands gesticulate, until their attention is no longer on the tome in their hands but solely centred on Crowley. Their faces turning various shades of pink at the quiet remarks that he makes under his breath that Aziraphale can’t quite hear, but whatever they are they enough of an impression for the people to casting lingering looks over their shoulders as they leave the shop; Crowley returning their blushing glances with small waves.

The last straw comes when a woman, who has been clutching one of his signed copies of Huckleberry Finn for an infuriatingly long time, reaches up and brushes imaginary dust off of Crowley’s shoulder. 

“Excuse me.” He bites, crossing the shop towards them in a few strides, and snapping his fingers at the door, “but as you can see, we are _quite closed_.”

The woman gapes at him, glancing between him and the door—where a ‘closed for business’ sign has suddenly made its presence known, a storm of indignation gathering on her face. Crowley, for his part, looks like he’s trying not to laugh.

“You know, darling,” She says, aiming her comment at Crowley, but keeping her eyes narrowed at Aziraphale, “I think you’re quite right; this book really isn’t my cup of tea.”

She shoves the book at Crowley, who gives a slight ‘oof’ noise as it connects with his chest, before turning and storming out of the shop, slamming the door rather hard behind her.

“Have you ever thought about owning a library instead?” Crowley asks, placing the book carefully back on the shelf. “I mean, what’s the point of owning a bookshop if you don’t _actually_ want to sell any books?” 

Aziraphale scoffs. “I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”

Crowley’s brow furrows. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Aziraphale turns on his heel and goes into the back of the shop, pulling the blinds down at the front with another snap of his fingers.

“Hang on—Aziraphale—” Crowley calls, following him, “What’s gotten into you?”

“What’s gotten into me—” Aziraphale turns to look at him incredulously. “Do you _really_ not know?”

Crowley freezes in the middle of the room, curled into himself slightly as though preparing himself for another verbal blow and it hits Aziraphale, blindingly, and breathlessly, that he really doesn’t.

“Know _what_?” Crowley snaps, as though warning a predator to keep its distance.

“Crowley, I— ” He tries to swallow amid the dryness in his throat and mouth, taking a deep breath to steady himself before slowly moving to cross the space between them. Crowley doesn’t move backwards away from him or forwards to meet him, just watches him move closer and closer until they’re close enough to reach out and touch one another.

Aziraphale reaches up to take his glasses off, and Crowley catches his wrist, his hand trembling slightly.

“Don’t.”

“Take them off.” Aziraphale pleads, softly, barely more than a whisper between them.

“Why.” Crowley grinds out, hackles all the way up.

Aziraphale isn’t fazed. “Because I have to tell you something and I want to be able to see your eyes when I do it.”

Neither of them moves for a moment, but then, without relaxing his grip on Aziraphale’s wrist, Crowley slowly raises his other hand and takes his glasses off his face.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale says, and he can see the fear barely being held at bay in those yellow eyes, can almost taste it in the way that his entire body has begun to tremble now, “I love y—"

“ _No._ ”

The word is guttural, torn from some place buried deep within, and Crowley drops Aziraphale’s wrist like it had burnt him, closing his eyes and backing away. “No, no you don’t—you _can't_ —”

“Says who?” Aziraphale presses, following after him. “Heaven? Hell? We both know they don’t matter anymore.”

Crowley is shaking his head desperately, still backing away. “You don’t understand—”

“Then _tell me_.” Aziraphale catches his arm, holding him in place. “Because all I know is that I love you and I’m fairly certain you love me.”

Crowley winces like each word was fingers dipped in holy water and pressed to his skin, a frantic pleading look to his eyes. “This— _love_ —it doesn’t— _work right_ with me, it gets all— _twisted_ and—and—ruined— _I_ ruin it.”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale shakes his head, “why on earth would you think that—”

“You were there.” Crowley tries to twist out of Aziraphale’s grip, but he refuses to let him go, “You saw what happened to him—to Matthew—I can’t—”

He stops struggling, all the fight leaving him in an instant, and he rests his forehead against Aziraphale’s shoulder. “I can't do that—not to _you_ —I’d rather let them—throw me in a sea of holy water than let _that_ happen to _you_.”

It takes him a moment to realize what Crowley is saying, trying to connect the name Matthew throughout their shared history—

But when he does, he throws his arms around Crowley, clutching him fiercely.

“That— _that_ was not your fault, Crowley—”

“It was—”

 _“No.”_ Aziraphale brings his hands to Crowley’s face, raising it from his shoulder until he’s looking Aziraphale in the eyes. “Crowley, we’ve both seen how bad human beings can go—the French revolution, the Spanish inquisition, the second world war—none of those were any of your fault. And neither was this.”

“You don’t know that.” Crowley whispers, eyes caught in Aziraphale’s.

Aziraphale smiles softly at him, an unbearable fondness blooming in his chest. “Yes, my dear, I do.”

And he leans forward and presses their lips together.

The kiss is gentle, soft, and for a moment Crowley doesn’t move—just stands there shaking in Aziraphale’s arms.

But then he’s surging forward, meeting the soft push of Aziraphale’s lips with his own frenzied ones, arms wrapping around the angel’s neck and hands tangling in his short white hair. Aziraphale lets himself be overwhelmed for a moment by the sensations he’s been craving for so long, warmth spreading throughout his entire being, before kissing Crowley back with just as much fervor.

When they finally break for air, taking ragged breaths, Aziraphale drinks in the sight of Crowley, his pupils wide, cheeks flushed, staring at Aziraphale like he’s the most precious thing in the whole universe, and he feels like his heart might burst from being so full. 

“I love you.” Aziraphale brings a hand up to caress Crowley’s face, his thumb stroking his cheek gently, and Crowley closes his eyes and leans into the touch, “I’ll say it as often as you need me to, until you believe it; and then I imagine I’ll say it even more after that.”

Crowley’s eyes flicker open, and the words stumble off his lips, clumsy and heavy with all the years they’ve sat unspoken on his tongue, but they still make Aziraphale’s heart soar.  

“I love you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Next chapter will be Aziraphale POV


End file.
